Montgomery County dedicated a new pedestrian underpass beneath Rockville Pike (Route 355) at the Medical Center Metro station Friday in honor of a former county official.

       The walkway allows pedestrians and cyclists to cross beneath the busy road between the Metro station and National Institutes of Health on one side and the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center — Montgomery’s two largest employers — on the other. Before the pandemic, about 7,000 people crossed the road daily, county officials said.

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       The underpass was built as part of a major expansion of Walter Reed at the Bethesda campus of the former National Naval Medical Center in 2011.

       The underpass will be named for Phil Alperson, who died in 2020 and had overseen the project for the county’s transportation department before his retirement. While the underpass was dedicated Friday, it opened in December.